The WTI fell by 5.3%, regaining some ground after plunging 8% in the first Asian exchanges. Brent yielded 3.1%.
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Crude oil prices fell sharply in Asia on Monday after the postponement of a meeting between the OPEC cartel and Russia, which has delayed the prospect of an agreement to support prices.
The American barrel of WTI for delivery in May fell 5.3% to 26.83 dollars around 2.50 GMT, regaining some ground after plunging 8% in the first Asian exchanges.
The price of a barrel of Brent North Sea crude for June delivery was down 3.1% to 33.04 dollars.
Crude markets have plunged since the start of a price war two weeks ago between Saudi Arabia and Russia, following a disagreement over the strategy to support prices. Saudi Arabia has opened the floodgates of its production and is turning prices upside down in the hope of bending Russia.
At the same time, demand has melted, as the coronavirus crisis and drastic measures to restrict movement put in place by states paralyze economic activity over a large part of the globe.
Prices rebounded last week from an 18-year low after tweets from Donald Trump hoping for an end to the price war. He announced a future meeting between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Russia.
But analysts’ doubts about a speedy resolution to the price war were heightened when news of the meeting was postponed.
The videoconference meeting originally scheduled for Monday has been postponed to Thursday, authorities of Azerbaijan, an oil producing country outside the cartel, said over the weekend.
The US president surprised investors last week by saying “hope and expect” that production will drop by about 10 million barrels a day, and perhaps much more.
On Friday, Moscow said it was ready to discuss a reduction in production volumes of some 10 million barrels a day.
But for Stephen Innes, head of global market strategy at AxiCorp, “brokers remain very skeptical about the likelihood of a deal, and if confirmed, it should unfortunately be insufficient to compensate for the overflowing supply.”
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